The business and culture of our digital lives, from the L.A. Times

Square, the rapidly growing mobile paymentstart-up, named Silicon Valley veteran Vinod Khosla to its board of directors on Tuesday.

Khosla, who founded Khosla Ventures and was one of the founders of Sun Microsystems, is among the earliest investors in Square, which lists Twitter Chairman Jack Dorsey as its CEO.

"Square is thrilled to welcome Vinod to our board," Dorsey said in a statement on the appointment. "We have worked closely with Khosla Ventures since our inception and Vinod's expertise, history and input will be a tremendous asset to our company as we continue to grow."

Khosla founded Khosla Ventures in 2004, in large part with his own money, and currently manages more than $1 billion in investor money. The firm focuses on "clean technologies and information technologies," Square said.

"In 2009, Khosla Ventures led Square's initial venture round queuing up the company for its launch, and participated in Square's Series B round in January 2011," the mobile payment firm said.

Khosla not only co-founded Sun but also served as its first CEO and chairman. He was also previously a general partner at the Silicon Valley venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, which in recent months was joined by Meg Whitman, the former EBay CEO who lost the California governor's race last year, and Mary Meeker, a renowned technology analyst.

At Square, Khosla is taking the board seat of Gideon Yu, Facebook's former chief financial officer, who recently left both the company's board and Khosla Ventures to become the chief strategy officer of the San Francisco 49ers pro-football team.